


disorderly, and marvelous, and ours

by NinthFeather



Series: Oh Valley of Plenty [4]
Category: Gundam 00
Genre: Complicated Relationships, Gen, Post-Series Pre-Movie, Reconciliation, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-03
Updated: 2020-06-03
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:32:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24523894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NinthFeather/pseuds/NinthFeather
Summary: Marie and Soma start an exchange diary. It doesn't fix everything, but it helps.
Relationships: Allelujah Haptism/Marie Parfacy, Marie Parfacy & Soma Peries, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Series: Oh Valley of Plenty [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1769428
Comments: 4
Kudos: 15





	disorderly, and marvelous, and ours

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ZScalantian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZScalantian/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Yet, Good](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6778990) by [iwouldgetaniguana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwouldgetaniguana/pseuds/iwouldgetaniguana). 



> This fic is for [ZScalantian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZScalantian)([@tournamentsofroses](https://tournamentsofroses.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr), who requested “a Gundam 00 fic centered around Soma and Marie’s relationship.” I wrote wayyyyyy more than planned, as you may have noticed.
> 
> This fic was heavily influenced by [Yet, Good](https://archiveofourown.org/works/6778990) by iwouldgetaniguana, which is arguably the defining work on this topic.
> 
> Title from Ada Limón’s splendid poem [“What It Looks Like To Us and the Words We Use.”](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/56379/what-it-looks-like-to-us-and-the-words-we-use)

In the Ural Mountains, a year into her journey with Allelujah, Marie felt pinned to the spot by realization.

“Soma never got to see anything like this,” she said aloud, staring out over the breathtaking horizon, savoring the cool air in her lungs.

Soma was a tool of war; she’d been molded into the SSI’s ideal pilot and given only the barest taste of normal life by the Colonel. Marie’s sterile, isolated childhood was hardly better, but that just meant that both of them had reason to crave the freedom that only Marie had right now.

She could still feel Soma, sleeping in a corner of her mind. Their bond didn’t involve the same kind of competitive jockeying for control as Allelujah and Hallelujah’s, but she had a pretty good idea of how to pull Soma forward, and how to settle back.

The idea scared her. She was worried about resurfacing in another decade, to a body that she once again didn’t recognize. But…she had to trust that Allelujah wouldn’t let that happen. She had to trust that Soma was better than that.

So, she talked it over with Allelujah, and when they camped out for the night, she took out a notebook and scrawled a note for Soma on the first blank page. Then, when she went to sleep, she let herself fall deep, deep down.

* * *

Soma woke up in a tent. Her hair was braided, and she was wearing a dress. Allelujah was asleep to her left, and there was an open notebook to her right.

Marie had left her a note.

“ _You’re hiking the Ural Mountains with Allelujah, and he knows to expect you, not me_ ,” it said. “ _If it’s okay, please let me have control of the body after a day or two. But I’d like you to enjoy some of this trip, too.”_

She sat bolt upright, then wriggled out of the sleeping bag, ignoring Allelujah’s half-asleep grumbling. When she peeked out of the front flap of the tent, the cold wind hit her in the face, along with the first rays of dawn.

Hiking with Allelujah was a strange experience. She barely knew him as anything other than an enemy, but he kept reaching for her hand, only to pull back when he remembered who she was.

But the hike itself was…good. The Colonel had introduced her to a few flowers, but the ones that grew this high up were new to her. And there was something about the mixture of rocky terrain and thin air that sent adrenaline rushing through her.

She wrote a neat, “ _Thank you,”_ at the bottom of the notebook page before she gave the body back to Marie.

* * *

Over the course of the trip, the notebook turned into an exchange diary of sorts. Short, perfunctory notes about where they were and what they were doing turned into descriptions of what each of them had and hadn’t liked about the day’s activities.

Marie stepped back to let Soma go to a war memorial with Allelujah.

Soma spent a day helping Allelujah plan a date night for him and Marie, then stepped back to let it happen.

“ _Make sure you stop at the bakery with the little square cakes before you leave town,”_ Marie wrote. _“I can’t spell the name, but Allelujah will know what you mean. You have to try them at least once, trust me.”_

 _“Have you watched the sunset from the balcony yet?”_ Soma wrote. _“You should. I think it’s why this hotel charges so much.”_

It was harder to venture into deeper topics, but they managed.

 _“I wish you hadn’t had to fight_ ,” Marie wrote, after filling a whole page with descriptions of a botanical garden.

 _“I didn’t mean to forget you, you know,_ ” Soma admitted, somewhere in the middle of a discussion of why she didn’t really get the play she’d gone to with Allelujah.

It was hard, communicating like this. It made them feel like they were farther apart than they actually were.

But they had a nearly full notebook that testified to how well it worked, so they were sticking to it for now.

**Author's Note:**

> The square cakes Marie mentions are petit-fours, which is not said at all like it's spelled, and would be a challenge to pronounce for people who I headcanon were probably brought up speaking either Russian or Mandarin Chinese.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
